You’ve heard it before—time is money. With rapidly evolving technology, organizations are streamlining all kinds of tasks. Using investor relations tools and capitalizing on automation has surpassed the “nice to have” stage and skyrocketed into a “must-have to deliver the expected level of service” stage. Technology can make organizations more efficient, give their employees and clients the information they need precisely when they need it, and automate repetitive tasks that take up valuable time.
Private Equity (PE) is booming with more allocated capital in the past five years than at any point in history. At the same time, deals are more complex, and regulations are tightened. Plus, competition is fierce.
That’s why it’s never been more important for PE firms to leverage investor relations tools to deliver value as efficiently and error-free as possible. Firms with a human-centric approach that incorporate technologies can support their IR teams with data-driven insights, automation, and tools that help establish stronger, longer-lasting relationships.
It’s no longer enough to simply put together a report with color-coded pie charts and bar graphs. Today, the success of your business depends on sharing relevant data with all stakeholders involved. After all, if you don’t, your competitors will.
Firms have many tools at their fingertips, but which ones are the most critical for fundraising and performance? Below we outline five investor relations tools to automate outreach, streamline processes, and focus on what matters most—keeping investors happy.
Email Marketing Tools
Email is a top communication tool that has stood the test of time as part of an effective outreach strategy. Why not incorporate automation that leverages this powerful tool to help with prospecting, fundraising, deal announcements, roadshows, and more?
Your firm doesn’t have hours to spend painstakingly writing individual emails for every one of your investors. At the same time, it’s not advised to blast off emails to a general list every few days—it can feel generic and impersonal. Investors will get annoyed if they receive messages that are irrelevant to them.
Fortunately, it’s possible to avoid these problems and improve your ROI with marketing automation. Email marketing tools allow LPs to segment their audience and send timely and relevant messages depending on actions taken, interests, and/or relationship details.
Automating email can also reduce the manual labor IR teams spend on common workflows and regular communications. Technology allows these types of outreach to be customized, automated, accessible, and distributed at the right time.
Document Generation
Your firm likely needs to create all kinds of documents for investors. Creating these documents one at a time is tedious and leaves room for human errors. It’s super easy to enter in the wrong number or name, causing confusion, loss of trust, or worse, accidentally sharing private information.
Document generation is an easy way to create dozens or even hundreds of documents simultaneously, saving firms vast amounts of time and money. With document generation tools, firms can generate and send personalized Capital Call Notices, PPMs, Distribution Notices, K1s, and Quarterly/Annual Reports. And with the proper guidelines in place, you can trust that your documents will always be accurate and on time.
Portal Access
Stakeholder relations rely on timely and secure information, transparency, and clear communication. A self-serve portal allows investors to safely get the information they are looking for whenever they need it.
It’s advantageous to empower investors to access the information they’re looking for instead of continuously relying on the IR team. Through Altvia’s secure portal, investors can review information and analytics at any time of day or night. There’s no need for investors to wait for an IR team to return their calls or emails—all the information they seek is in the portal.
A bonus of GP-PL Engagement Portals is that IR teams can monitor the information that investors seek. This view into their actions gives a better idea of investors’ interests and concerns. Stakeholder relationships improve as IRs discover talking points and events that their investors want to know about.
Like the one available with Altvia, a portal reduces time spent on one-off requests and takes advantage of firms’ data, interactions, and industry knowledge to build stronger investor relations.
Digital Signatures
These days, sending a document to an investor that they need to print, sign, and scan to send back can be incredibly inconvenient and unnecessarily time-consuming. Businesses in every industry are switching to digital signatures.
Not only are digital signatures more convenient, but they also allow you to track your digital signing process and manage users or groups with ease. You’ll gain better visibility on what has been signed and whose signatures you may be waiting on. Plus, the best digital signature applications include automated requests and reminders to help move along the process without seeming pushy.
Investor Dashboards
Dashboards are an excellent way to view and compare a great deal of data in an easily digestible manner. PE firms need a business intelligence tool that connects, transforms, normalizes, and displays data to empower stakeholders to find insights quickly.
LPs often get bombarded with notifications of their investment performance towards the end of a deal cycle. Investors want to know when they will receive returns on their investments but might not want other details like when the tax reporting for a particular portfolio is done. This is where dashboards come in.
Dashboards get the most relevant data out of the least amount of back and forth and documentation. Altvia comes with pre-built dashboards and reports, setting firms up for success on day one. As the client evolves, so do the dashboards.
A solid investor relations dashboard is customizable to the LP’s taste. Altvia’s custom dashboards allow firms to personalize their data visualizations and display their interpretation of performance.
Gain Trust with Investor Relations Tools
The best way to stay in tune with your client’s business is by leveraging technology so you can provide additional value and set your firm apart. Trust for firms will only grow with the combination of tailored communication, the ability to let LPs have a complete view of the inner workings of their investments, and tools that streamline regular processes.
